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Alexis Alscher
Reichkommissar Alexis Alscher is one of the primary characters of Liberation and alternates between roles of antagonist and protagonist. By 2002, she's risen to be the defacto ruler of the restored East Germany by leading the specially formed Council of Commissars . She remains an active combatant despite this role and leads the 501st Reiter Battalion in battle herself as one of the most deadly and ruthless pilots in the nation. Alexis' only positive role model in her early life was the infamous major Beatrix Brehme who commanded the original Stasi Werewolf Battalion. Alexis considers that she owes her life and sanity both to the major, and that without her, she would have died, become a complete sociopathic monster, or both. As such, she remains fanatically loyal to the ideals she learned from Beatrix, even 20 years after they've been pulled apart, and lives to make their legacy a reality. History Early life Like many in East Berlin, Alexis was the only child of a relatively poor and overworked family, where simply having food on the plate and a roof on their heads was the most they could aspire to. Life then was bleak and without much of any hope for improvement in sight, but that alone had not been enough break their spirits. The fear of the Stasi as a sort of omnipresent devil or boogeyman who had eyes and ears everywhere was common among the citizen of East Germany in those years, but among the Alscher family, it took even greater proportions. Alexis' father was a deeply paranoid man who believed fully in all the most sordid rumors about the ministry and their agents, and as such was always chasing ghosts and watching his every words. This of course meant that the rest of the family was expected to do the same. Failure to comply would mean punishment. In a slight variation, however, Alexis' father was also equally distrustful of the various anti-state underground movements, whom he believed to be just as dangerous, whether it be because they would use and crush anyone to achieve their goals or because associating with them was punishable with death. With that in mind, Alexis' father may have been unhinged and paranoid, but he was not the kind to surrender. As such, he had managed to smuggle firearms into the household, and had taught Alexis from an extremely young age - much younger than any sane adult would consider reasonable - to use and maintain firearms, in need they would need to protect themselves from either boogeyman groups. The charade of fear ended up partially justified when both of Alexis' parents were killed in the bombing of a factory used in the war effort by anti-state saboteurs. She was nearly killed as well, but was only narrowly spared from the explosion by the fact that she lagged behind her parents to observe a commotion that was taking place on the other side of the street. After her parent's death, with no money, no useful work skills, no other relatives, and no connections, Alexis was taken care of collectively by the people's militia of the factory her parents used to work at before. She was barely 10 at the time. The experience left her deeply shaken, and scarred into her mind a burning hatred for terrorists, saboteurs and all other such traitors and "enemies of the people" as she would later call them. Under the charge of the people's militia, she attempted to make herself useful, but she was only good at helping with menial labor and at, to their surprise, handling firearms. Owing to rapid growth, both physical and emotional, she was able to lie about her age and to enroll into the NVA at the immature age of 13, passing off for the minimal age requirement of 15. There, her incredible marksmanship for her age was quickly noticed, which allowed her into TSF aptitude tests, in which she scored above average. Schwarzesmarken After joining the NVA and finishing a rather short training regimen, thanks in past to the people's militia already showing her the bases, she was soon assigned to serve in the 666th TSF squadron. There, she remained fairly isolated, as her personality had turned sour, jaded and cynical. She was unpopular with other pilots, as despite her good handling and effectiveness, she was just a perpetual downer who either didn't remember when to keep her mouth shut, or just chose to ignore it. She briefly opened up towards one of the pilots there and eventually learned to control her words, but it was too late, and after just a few months of service, she was arrested on suspicion of anti-state collaboration. Under the captivity of the Stasi, she suffered the same pressure as any other suspect would, heedless of age. She was starved, isolated, beaten, and psychologically tortured to the satisfaction of a variety of tormentors, the faces and names of which she blanked out of her memory. All of them except one: Heinze Axmann. The reputation of the brown beast of the Stasi when it came to being an opportunist and a sadist was well-established, as was his tendency to pick out young girls whom struck his fancy. It was no different for Alexis. During an interrogation by Axmann, Alscher reached her breaking point, unable to endure any more, but instead of yielding and making false confessions, she was overtaken by a fit of seething rage. She screamed her hatred for the terrorists who had taken her family away from her; how much she loathed them, despised them, had no mercy or forgiveness for them. She then continued by saying there was no she would ever cooperate with those enemies of the people, even on threat of death, at which point she fell quiet and said no more. Entertained by her outburst and seeing potential, Heinze Axmann decided to strike a deal with her. She was to prove her loyalty to the state and usefulness through actions rather than words. Immediately, Alexis accepted. She was afterwards brought to a different cell where a small group of captured rebels were being held. Axmann explained their crimes summarily and how their death had already been decided, but that it was desired to at least try to extract some information from them before the act. Again, she accepted without any questions, and was lent a handgun for her trouble, "For credibility" she was told. Naturally, two armed guards were behind, ready to stop her if stupid thoughts of turning it back on her captor crossed her mind. Entering the cell with a ghastly look and eyes mixing hollowness and cold hatred, she was quick to make demands, but the rebels simply ignored her like it was all some sort of practical joke. In response, she displayed great ruthlessness by immediately shooting one of the captives, springing the others to shock and outrage. Without so much as flinching after taking her first life in cold blood after everything she had been through, she repeated her inquiries, firearm brandished. Another of the rebels soon spoke to reveal the identity of their leader, but the man was also shot immediately afterwards. Heinze stepped in with curiosity, asking why she killed the man whom had answered her question. Alexis coldly responded that she knew he had been lying because the name he had given belonged to someone from the militia, whom she knew to have died shortly before she joined the NVA. The last criminal was quick afterwards to give them everything they wanted to hear in exchange for survival. After this ordeal and some retraining, Alexis was accepted as a member of the Stasi under Heinze's command. Her list of sins and misdeeds quickly grew in size and in intensity under the orders of the brown beast until she had became the very monster her father had been so terrorized of. She dedicated her life to making the country a safer place by eliminating saboteurs, terrorists, and all other roots of dissent, and she did so with such drive and such great contempt for treason that she attracted the attention of another mentor: Beatrix Brehme. Due to her aptitude and loyalty, she was transferred to the Werewolf Battalion, with which she would remain for a year and half. There, she found herself surrounded by like-minded people, but also people who still had humanity left in them. It is their support, and the exemplar ideal incarnated by Beatrix which made her realize she was on a warpath of self-destruction. For the first time, she began to feel regret for some of her sins, and she learned to live as a human being once again, rather than just a hollow tool that existed solely to serve the purposes of the ministry. More than anything else, this was when she relearned how to care about other people, after the hellhole that had been her life before made her forget. To Alexis, the other Werewolves were friends, family and confidants all in one, even despite -or perhaps even because of - how blood-stained and ruthless each and every one of them was. As the situation in East Germany worsened, Alexis was ordered to reintegrate the NVA under the cover of a simple soldier. Her mission was to monitor the NVA and to keep watch for any sign of desertion or dissent, as well as to prevent such behaviors from appearing, by any means necessary. She was assigned as the new captain of the 638th TSF Squadron, a unit which still had many TSFs, but which's morale was at an all-time low, and whose loyalty was greatly questioned. There, she managed to turn the unit around and recover their morale and fighting spirit by putting into practice everything about leadership and duty she had learned by watching Beatrix, shaping it into one of the most effective fighting forces of the NVA. (WIP) Exile In the aftermath of the Berlin Incidents, while Alexis did survive the battles themselves, she only escaped summary execution at the hands of the revolutionary army because some of its leaders wanted to use her status as last remaining commissioned officer of the Stasi TSF battalions for a public execution. They intended to use her death as a symbol of the end of the regime, but there was also a very pronounced desire for revenge due to all the insurgents who had died at her hands. In the end however, the rebels made a grave miscalculation. While most loyalist forces surrendered immediately following the loss of Beatrix, their spirits broken, Alexis was only further galvanized in her hatred of the insurgent and she resolved that she could not allow herself to die, because the ideals of her loved mentor would die as well. As a result of this all, she was relatively lightly guarded in captivity, and she managed to escape her prison cell, disappear underground, and even commandeer one of the last operational Cheburashkas in the remaining secret bases of the Stasi in Berlin. With the NVA now answering to the provisional government established by the insurgents, a flight of Balalaikas was sent in pursuit to intercept, but was shot down to the last MiG. Following this, Alexis requested asylum in the Soviet Union, claiming that the revolution was illegitimate and had been sponsored by Western interests. Considering the submissive tone of the reunification talks that followed with West Germany, there was a certain credibility to her words, and the Soviets saw no reason to refuse a free machine and pilot to press right back into military service. For the twenty years that followed, Alexis fought relentlessly in the Soviet Army, from the Urals all the way to Kamchatka, managing to survive the brutal conflict through a mixture of skill, stubborn tenacity and savage ferocity. She was originally somewhat distrusted due to her origins and due to the increasing divide within the Union between ethnic Russians and non-Russian soldiers, which were often seen as second-class troops and citizen, but she managed to pull through and garner begrudging respect from the Russians. A survivor of countless battles and a skilled leader, she eventually rose back in rank through the years and found her way back to a first-line unit. By the late 90s, she had earned the rank of Major and was leading the 101st Guards Tactical Armor Group, with which she stayed for many years, finally intent on passing on what she had learned until now. Liberation When the news of the formation and goal of the Varangian Company reached the far lands of Kamchatka, Alexis was immediately interested. With their goal of mounting a new international offensive in central Europe, she saw it as a chance to reclaim her real homeland from the BETA. Although by this point she had spent more years in Russia than she had in East Germany, she still saw herself as a German first, in no small part due to the racial segregation of the Union. Seeing a new offensive in the West as something that could potentially distract the BETA and shift focus away from the Easternlands, she was allowed to return to Europe with her current machine, a MiG-29M2 Lastochka. With her past mostly forgotten by now and only known to a select few among the higher ups of the Nordic Council, she was able to keep a relatively low profile initially and not to draw too much attention as she appraised and analysed the new international movement, estimating its people, methods, and chances of success. This situation came to an abrupt change when a member of the command team and the main intelligence officer of the Varangians were suddenly abducted by an unknown assailant, which was soon revealed to be an underground cell of rogue KGB and former Stasi elements trying to obtain leverage for purposes yet unknown to her. Alexis used her access to the ancient Stasi files she had kept with her to narrow down and find out the location of the operatives' secret base of operation in the BETA-controlled former Austro-hungarian territory. The hostiles had taken residence in one of the abandoned underground forts which dotted the landscape of the Socialist countries. Once located, the bunker complexes were put under siege and attacked by a large Scandinavian force, but the defenders were firmly dug in and were resigned to fight to the death. Alexis managed to convince the garrison to surrender during negotiations by informing them that the King of Sweden, the defacto ruler of the Nordic Council, intended to allow the liberated lands of East Germany to retain its independence. This directly opposed the wishes of the Western countries and powers among the UN who instead wanted to see the East German lands integrated subserviently into Western Germany and de-socialized. Following the rescue, preparations were set in motion for an assault on the Budapest Hive. Although the command team had been gathered to bring a variety of different perspective and a great pool of experience with veteran pilots from all across the globes, most stayed nearly silent. In the end, it was Alexis who took care of nearly the entire planning stage, with only the official commander of the Varangian pilots, Avery Nelson, daring to take actions, suggest elements and bring criticism if needed be. Shortly before the assault was set to take place, however, a serie of strange incidents took place. While the Company was out on a culling mission, they received a distress signal from the defensive lines and learned of a herd of BETA which had appeared out of seemingly nowhere and started wrecking havoc from behind the lines. They moved back in pursuit, but Alexis was quick to note that some elements did not add up, and her suspicion was furthered when their communications were jammed during their battle with the BETA. Upon returning to the base, Alexis found it in lock-down as security and intelligence seemed to be compromised. Not satisfied with this, Alexis managed to sneak out from the base despite the lock-down with the intent to investigate the distress signal by herself, as she believed any report that came to them could potentially have been falsified or modified by conspirators. Roughly at the same time, a saboteur caused a generalized blackout in the Varangians' entire complex and a battle ensued as loyalists attempted to purge conspirators and subversive elements. Over on the front line, Alexis was able to confirm that similar jamming devices prevented the forward position from calling for help in time, and that humans had done an inside job to cut the way wide open for the BETA to stampede through. Among the chaos of the purge, Alrid disappeared once again, but this time on her own initiative. With subversive elements now rooted out, the advance on the Budapest Hive followed with little delay. During the infiltration, Alexis led the Varangians' command team and was the first pilot to enter the Hive. Her strategy was to ignore as many of the BETA as possible and make a swift rush for the Main Chamber. For that purpose, she ordered the team to fly as close to the ceiling as possible, following her lead in close single-line formation. Alexis, piloting a newly acquired and more powerful Su-47 Berkut, used the giant carapace of a slain Destroyer-class as a massive dozer blade to bash and plow through the hordes of Tank-class BETA which crawled on the ceiling, and had been known to leap down from above on TSFs attempting to advance conventionally in past, failed infiltration attempts. While the tactic succeeded and the squadron was able to reach the main Chambers, other units of the Scandinavian/UN coalition force were slaughtered, taking horrific casualties everywhere else in the Hive as they still attempted to push the line conventionally and were inevitably overwhelmed by the endless numbers of the BETA. As she progressed deeper into the Hive, Alexis came under an increasingly oppressive sensation of being watched and observed by something. This sensation became even more frightening when she began to hear what seemed like fragments of phantom transmissions on her Berkut's comm systems. It reached a boiling point in the Main Chamber itself, where she suffered a mental assault from an unknown entity she could not see. Panicking, she turned berserk while planting demolition charges and started firing frenetically at shadows. She only barely managed to recompose herself and evacuate in time before the explosion, emerging deeply scarred from the experience. After the successful demolition of the Budapest Hive, due to her overwhelming contributions, Alexis was allowed by the King of Sweden to lead the restoration effort in the reclaimed lands of East Germany. She demanded the unification of Berlin under East Germany and negotiated for the Silesian lands, Annexed by the Polish at the end of World War II, to be returned to German hands in order to use its vast resources to feed the war industry against the BETA. She formed the Council of Commissars, a gathering of 9 experts in their field from various ideological backgrounds who function in a manner analogous to ministers in democratic governments, to lead the country, and reserved a seat for herself. In the months that followed, with the Varangians needing to recover from the casualties suffered in the battle of Budapest, Alexis remained in East Germany, overviewing the implementation of a variety of new policies as well as the reformation of the armed forces in the National Volksarmee. She also stealthily re-instated a Stasi-like organization under the direct command of the Commissariat of Justice and Order, headed by Eleonore Metz, a fellow Werewolf survivor and long-standing friend of Alexis. Overall, however, the reformed East Germany boasted a more open-minded state, was open to refugees, and held less hostile relations towards the West. It also quickly entered a military alliance with the Nordic Council. During that time, Alexis also underwent an UN hearing in Sweden which meant to clear any remaining international charges that had remained against her for her activities in the Stasi. Once the hearing was over, she traveled to the ports with Avery where she came under attack by an assassination attempt. She was pushed down by the Varangian captain who took the bullets in her stead. Alexis quickly unholstered her sidearm and shot her assailant, but protective gear prevented the bullets from wounding. After getting Avery to medical assistance, she proceeded to halfheartedly chastise him for needlessly risking his life as she wore her bulletproof under her dress outfit. All of the various schemes and attacks were eventually tied back to a large group of Allegiance-aligned terrorists in Sweden, which had managed to establish a fortified base in the mountainous shores and to stockpile illegally-acquired TSFs. Alexis then organized a joint operation with the Nordic Council, calling for a two-pronged assault with the Scandinavians coming from in-land in the east and an amphibious Volksmarine assault coming from the west, both preceded by a combined bombardment of naval and land artillery. The cell was quickly crushed, with only few members being taken alive. A few months afterwards, a coalition force of Scandinavians and East Germans left the European mainland on a long trip to Japan to assist in the imminent assault on the Sadogashima Hive. Alexis led the German expeditionary forces, composed of the newly reassembled 501st Reiter Battalion and of the 10th Panzer Division. Upon their arrival there, she assisted in the drafting of he treaties with the Japanese government. After landing in Yokohama, in November, she planned the retaking and defense of the strategically important port city of Niigata. Its location was vital as a stepping stone as it was very close to the Sadogashima island and holding the city meant the shortest possible supply lines for the actual invasion of Sadogashima. Shortly after taking position in the city, a BETA incursion came in from the north, but the Scandinavian/German coalition forces were quickly able to defeat the BETA herd. During the battle, UN units were spotted acting erratically outside the city outskirts and were suspected of having been using to capture live BETA by the UN. On the turn of December, the expeditionary Corp was suddenly besieged by a curtain of Japanese forces in the wake of a nationalist coup that broke out in Kyoto. The action enraged Alscher so much that she nearly ordered a assault on the Japanese, seeing it as an unforgivable act of betrayal, but she restrained herself and ultimately, although reluctantly, participated in the retaking of the Imperial capital from the nationalist insurgents, on the side of the loyalist-UN force. Shortly after the incident, she was invited to Yokohama to witness the unveiling of new OS technology designed by the Japanese and to participate in mock battles. While the Japanese Eishi displayed skill levels in piloting, navigation, gunnery and fortitude far above what the rank they were introduced at, they were no match in vicious urban close-quarters for Alexis and the senior officers of the 501st Battalion. (WIP) Beliefs and Personality Alexis has been known as a captivating individual who captures others' attention with a mixture of beauty and commanding presence. In first encounters, she often appears somewhat withdrawn, as she tends to act with modesty and to let others lead discussions, but that is a deceitful impression. Alexis thoroughly enjoy making others under-estimate her, whether that be in mind or in body, before utterly crushing them with no small amount of cruel sadism. She is otherwise rather playful, adopting an overall carefree expression sometimes bordering on flirt, which contrasts strangely with the air she gives. Alexis is however an extremely effective leader. She views loyalty as the most important value of all, but she also believes that loyalty goes both ways, and that it also means she has a nigh-sacred duty to every single soldier under her command to do her utmost and beyond for them. Alexis also always fight from the front, always making herself the tip of the spear where the fighting is the toughest as she believes it's necessary for a commander to display the same courage expected from the troops. These attitudes, mixed with her natural charisma and skillful strategies, make it easy for her to command the respect of her subordinates. She inspires others to greatness not just by leading by example, but also by directly motivating others to dare and try. She is resourceful in the extreme and tireless in her work, as she is thoroughly dedicated to making her ideals a reality. Those ideals, and everything about the way she leads, she gladly state to owe to Beatrix, and it is not simple her own vision, but their shared legacy she seeks to make a reality. Recent years awoke devouring ambition and a willingness to destroy anyone or anything standing in the way of the return to power of Germany and the extermination of the BETA, both which she believes to be tied to one another. Prior to her involvement with the Stasi, Alexis used to be an extremely lonely, jaded and cynical person, owing to her miserable life up to that point and poor background. She had essentially given up on finding any form of happiness in life and kept her distances from everyone else. This changed when she fell under the care of Beatrix Brehme. Finding a new family and close friends in the Werewolves, she began to live again and to fight for something she genuinely believed in, as well as with people she genuinely wanted to protect. This had miraculous effects on her mood and created great backlash, making her excessively cheerful and friendly, as if to make up for all the lost years. During the Berlin Incident, she almost returned to that former state when everything and everyone she loved was taken away from her, but she vowed to survive and to not let herself be crushed by grief. To this day, her hatred of traitors, saboteurs, terrorists and revolutionaries knows no bounds. Alexis has been known to summarily execute traitors without any mercy or second thoughts as soon as they reveal their true colors, even if she had been on good terms with them just before. She is also relentless in hunting down those who flee or escape, as well as in getting to the bottom of any suspicion. Quotes "The most convincing deceptions are those that are built on truths." - Alexis defends her methods in the Stasi after being accused of being too soft. "Looks like those pathetic animals are at it again. They never learn do they? Well, it doesn't matter. Let's show the world who the true apex predators here really are." - Alexis to her subordinates before a BETA charge. "The West and East can bicker as much as they want, but we have to be above that if we want to win this war. We are one people: Humanity. Race is obsolete. Religion is obsolete. The Germany I envision will welcome all who want to stand and fight together as comrades." - Alexis on factionalism. Category:Characters